Feminine Gender

[iffr762 at utxvms.cc.utexas.edu]

	Well, actually I have been unable to nail down anybody saying that
the IE feminine is supposed to be from the former inanimate, though the
fact that it does not show /-s/ might be taken as implying this.  Oh ye
Keepers of the Conventional Wisdom, what is it?

	I must say however that interrogatives (like Latin "quem" used as
a feminine) have nothing to do with anything.  Here the lack of a full set
of distinctions comes from the fact that speakers cannot necessarily know
the gender (or number) of the referrent (which has something to do with
why they are asking, duh).  In Old English there is no distinction of
number (or gender) in interrogatives, and a plural form ("hwa") is used
for the nominative.  This does not mean that an earlier form of the
language had no distinction of singular/plural (though for PIE we might
think that for other (i.e. good) reasons).  It means nothing more than
what has been stated above.

	On other aspects of this issue I await enlightenment.

					DLW